Currys to sell only 'low-energy' light bulbs

[AB Asks]

Currys are to stop selling incandescent light bulbs in favour of energy saving varieties. The decision follows an announcement by Gordon Brown that he wants to remove old fashioned bulbs from houses by 2011. The chain of shops has made the decision after a 20-fold yearly increase in sales of low-energy bulbs, which means that they now make up 60% of the total sales. Should all shops follow Currys' lead? Or should it be down to the public to decide which light bulbs they use?

[sarah_louise]

I am getting a bit fed up of the Government deciding on the green issues for us.
I hate the low energy bulbs. They are not equivalent to a 100w bulb. They are dark and gloomy and different light altogether. As I am not jetting around the world or gas guzzling elsewhere leave my lightbulbs alone please.

[beryllium]

hmmmmm, is the rest of Europe doing this? or just this little island? in which case.... what's the point? or will the hole in the ozone be smaller over us lol.....

I am, as such, a tree hugger hehe..... having installed Solar Power and all our light bulbs are energy saving.
We are also going even more natural with a wood burner to run our heating in the winter, and we are fully insulated.

My real reason was because I wasn't too impressed with the gas and electric companies and their constant threats of hikes in bills.

Our first 3 months gas bill after installing the Solar was �1.20. And today the water temp is 55. The lowest it has been through the coldest days was 30.

To answer your question. It is entirely up to the individual how they light their houses, and some may not be able to afford the initial outlay for these bulbs unless they start now of course.

I'm still not sure which camp I follow with the theories of global warming. We don't get told what the other countries are doing.

We'll have to see what the dictatorship says the people must do.

[jake-the-peg]

We already have regulations stopping unnecessary wastage in buildings.

You are not allowed to build a poorly insulated house now, gas boilers have to be condensing ones that meet standard efficiency.

Oil and gas won't last forever (see peak oil) and deliberate wastage shouldn't be tolerated.

There needs to be a change in attitude

"I'll use tungsten bulbs if I want to" needs to become as acceptable as "I'll drop litter if I want to"

[MiniN]

why not make it mandatory for all businesses around the world to use these low-energy bulbs instead of making the public spend their money.

isnt that a better way of reducing wasted energy???

[tellboy]

I dont like them much,they are not bright enough even the big ones . We live in the UK which is dull and grey mostly like living inside a tupperware box. Apart from the saving in Electricity does anyone like them?
I am not switching on my Air Conditioning, or Under Floor heating, or electric garage doors because I dont have them.
Jake-the-Peg turn off that unecessary computer and wasting electricity on AnswerBank ?

[tellboy]

Just thought ! I had better go and "panic buy" a few gross of 100 Watt tunsten bulbs

[deggers316]

lets get every shopping malls in the uk and all the bars and pubs floodlight to hell ,daylight and all,to change to these pathetic low energy bulbs,that should make a difference toi this so called green house effect 'by the way WELL DONE CHANNEL 4 for blowing the lid in this con
and as to the earlier answer "what is the rest of Europe doing about this"???

[con-amca]

I used these energy-saving bulbs some time ago. I went back to the old ones after one of those I'd installed exploded, showering the (fortunately) empty room with tiny shards of glass. If anyone had been anywhere near it they'd have been badly cut. Needless to say, I've never
used them since, nor do I want to.

[Dudley]

What is going to happen to low voltage spot lights? There is no energy saving equivalant. Will all the fittings just be obsolete?

[heathfield]

What's the rest of Europe doing about it? There's already an EU directive on the way to say that everyone will be made to change to low-energy bulbs. http://news.scotsman.com/uk.cfm?id=380442007
Dimmables? 'We're working on that', say the manufacturers.
And what about the hundreds of thousands of electronic timers, including mine, that only work with incandescent bulbs? Compensation, perhaps? You're kidding!
Lasting up to 8 years? Read the small print. That's with only about 3 hours use a day.
Lousy colour spectrum, dimming with age,(though that's denied with newer bulbs), not lasting as long as stated, and expensive to make and buy, (there are recent mutterings about collusion between manufacturers over the last).

Anyway, from past experience, I'd never ever shop at Currys!

[beryllium]

hmmmm, will the countries such as Latvia, Lithuania, Czech Republic, Estonia, Slovakia, Slovenia, Poland......

Have these countries become balanced enough to be able to afford such 'luxuries' as long life rubbery lightbulbs?

Is the only way to police this going to be by banning incandescant bulbs? will candles be some peoples only form of light? lol....

We have got used to our light bulbs now, but they do look funny!!!.....the wall lights :-) and the chandaliers will never look the same again hehe :-)

[anotheoldgit]

Last one out of the country, please turn out the light.

[knobbynonuts]

Im stocking up on ordinary light bulbs as from now as the low energy ones are dull in light and hideous to look at this poxy goverment can stick the low energy ones right up there asre along with the rest of ther ideas.......

[EDLEE]

Seems that light bulbs aren't the issue. The real issue is whether or not the government ( or the majority if you want to look at it that way) has the right to tell us what to do because it's "good for us". We can easily rationalize most of the rules society makes for use on that basis, but take it to another level. We know that wasting energy is bad for us, but is watching football on the telly a waste? How about driving to the grandparents for a visit? Driving to the store? Driving to work? All uses of energy could be considered wasteful by someone, so who decides? There should be limits to everything, Including limits.

[tellboy]

How come this question keeps floating to the top of the list in Technology (look at the date submitted). How is this done ?

[Thunderchild]

well I think banning completely incandescent bulbs is not right but people should understand the need to change, all the lights in my house are cheap running, I agree that they are not equivalent to what the manufacturers say I have a so called 100 W (20 W) over my head and I am pretty sure it is more like 70-80 W but it is adequate,

unfortunately many people just don't care, I am afraid the green house effect does exist and theres no point saying so whats 100 W more, well i will tell you some information to muster on: only 2 % of that 100 W becomes light the other 98 W becomes heat, do you know another thing ? to produce that 100 W of electricity 300-350 W of power was used the other 200-250 W became heat and was dumped into the atmosphere, so for a bit of light up to 348 W of heat are turned out we don't think of that do we ? if it were a 40 watt bulb instead then there would be a waste of something like 100 W of heat big difference right ? we think green house effect means CO2 from our cars but we forget that there is a double blade to the green house effect: firstly CO2 helps trap heat causing a general warming of the planet secondly the production of CO2 always comes with the production of heat, a car engine and any combustion engine is never ever more than 35 % efficient so that 50 KW motor is making anything up to 100 KW or more of heat just think of how many cars on the road.

continues...

[Thunderchild]

also electric heating is a sad waste of power because again for every KW of heat we want another 2 KW are dumped into the atmosphere so gas heating is more energy eficient, however greenhouse effect wise it is best to use wood because gas and other fossil fuels contain the excess of CO2 that was eliminated from the atmosphere milions of years ago allowing life to come to it's present stage, if we release it all again we are going to be in deep sh!t. now wood only releases the CO2 that it previously eliminated up to 50 years ago and if we do not over cut there will be more trees thereto take it back and keep a balance

The issue is most people can't be bothered and don't care, what the government should do though is educate us not direct us like puppets, A dimmer can be replaced with 2 ...continued

separate bulbs of different power,

In italy where i live they don't give a damn about the environment unless some European law dictates it but that does not give other countries an excuse every body needs to pledge his share of common sense just because people around me do not care does not mean that i don't either, I do my part as far as possible

[johnizere]

couldn't be anything to do with the vat. collected on more expensive lightbulbs? I've said on other threads that I don't buy this global warming thing , neither will I buy snake oil if some shoddy salesman comes knocking on my door.

[heathfield]

Why it costs you...

Our EU regulators have been successfully lobbied by the European manufacturers of these light bulbs, such as Phillips, Siemens, etc.

As a result, a 66 percent import tariff has now been imposed on all such bulbs brought into the EU from China and the Far East.